


"Don't Move"

by Merixcil



Series: Whumptober 2019 [12]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Gen, Monsters, Peril
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:47:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25591534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merixcil/pseuds/Merixcil
Summary: There's a monster loose in the forest (yes, again)
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper & Maxine "Max" Mayfield
Series: Whumptober 2019 [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1838356
Kudos: 1





	"Don't Move"

When they finally stop running, it’s hard to tell if they’ve actually escaped danger or if they're just too exhausted to keep moving. El pushes the two of them forward, slightly slower than Max but with better endurance because of it, until they collapse in the hollow of a tree out in the woods. 

Their breathing comes heavy. Max tries to slow it down, draw shallower breaths but her lungs feel like they’re dying. So she gasps and shudders and hopes that it passes quickly. 

Beside her, El is in the same boat. They calm down together and then all that’s left is the hammering of their hearts, loud in their ears. 

“What was that?” Max whispers. 

El shakes her head. “Bad.”

Obviously. Max rolls her eyes. “Ok, but what was it?”

“Not the demogorgon.” El clarifies. “Not the mindflayer. Something new.”

“What do we do?”

“Wait.”

Even when you’re terrified and have been running for your life, being stuck in a damp hole in the dark is very boring. Max tries to hold herself steady, stay awake enough that if whatever was chasing them should come back, she can run, but not so tense that she feels like she’s dying. 

This would all be so much easier if the boys were here. The boys make stupid noises and have to be told to shut up and in the end keeping quiet and still isn’t even an option. Being sensible on your own, that’s the hard part. 

Carefully, Max stretches out her leg from where it’s pressed up under her at an uncomfortable angle. her foot hits the other side of the tree faster than she was anticipating, with a firm thump that she doesn’t like at all. 

El’s hand reaches out to catch her by the wrist. “Don’t move.” Her voice so quiet that for a second Max thinks she imagined it. 

Outside, leaves rustle and branches groan in the wind. Only it doesn’t sound like the wind, not quite. Something wind adjacent and not of this world. Max already knows that whatever happens, she doesn’t want to know what it really is. 

Carefully, and not entirely silently, El crawls over Max’s legs and out of the tree, rising to her feet so that the light of the moon catches her edges, imprinting her shape like a great dark beast against the outline of the trees. 

“El?” Max reaches forward, asking for a hand up to join her. 

In the dark, Max can just see the bounce of El’s hair when she shakes her head. “Don’t move.”

“Where are you going?”

“Don’t move.”

El slips away in a puff of nothing, leaving Max with her arm outstretched, trying to decide if she’s going to do as she’s told. 

Max is half way to getting her feet under her and making a beeline for wherever El is hiding, when the wind rises and the thrill of the unknown tends her tumbling back into the hollowed out tree. 

**Author's Note:**

> This work was originally posted as part of a multi chaptered 'whumptober' fic that I'm trying to split up. If you think you've read it before, you probably have


End file.
